Dust mop

ABSTRACT

A dust mop having a bottom section which is provided on the lower surface thereof with a tufted cotton yarn extending below the surface of the bottom section, and means for attaching the bottom section of a dust mop handle. The mop bottom section is provided with an outside fringe of continuous loops of yarn which is attached to the outer edges of the lower surface of the bottom section and which is extended outward therefrom. The outside fringe made by a process of weaving which forms a continuous loop of yarn that is interwoven with perpendicular sections of yarn going through the loops to form a shoulder which is attached to the bottom section of the mop.

United States Patent 1 Griffin et al.

[ Jan. 23, 1973 [541 DUST MOP [22] Filed: Dec. 24, 1970 [21] Appl.No.: 101,305

[52] US. Cl. ..l5/229 AP [51] Int. Cl. ..A47l 13/20 [58] Field of Search ....15/l47 R, 147 A, 228, 229 A,

15/229 AC, 229 AP, 229 B, 229 BC, 229 BP FOREIGN PATENTS OR APPLICATIONS 620,820 5/1961 Canada ..l5/229 HP 395,343 7/1933 Great Britain ..l5/229 AP Primary Examiner-Daniel Blum Attorney-Donnelly, Mentag & Harrington 5 7 ABSTRACT A dust mop having a bottom section which is provided on the lower surface thereof with a tufted cotton yarn extending below the surface of the bottom section, and means for attaching the bottom section of a dust mop handle. The mop bottom section is provided with an outside fringe of continuous loops of yarn which is attached to the outer edges of the lower surface of the bottom section and which is extended outward therefrom. The outside fringe made by a process of weaving which forms a continuous loop of yarn that is interwoven with perpendicular sections of yarn going through the loops to form a shoulder which is attached to the bottom section of the mop.

1 Claim, 4 Drawing Figures DUST MOP SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION This invention relates generally to dust mops and more particularly to a dust mop having an outside fringe comprising a plurality of continuous loops of dusting yarn.

Heretofore the prior art dust mops were all provided with yarn which extended downwardly from the bottom section of the mop. The prior art processes for making dust mops all included the disadvantageous step of bringing some of the yarn back into the inside section of the mop. A further disadvantage of the prior art dust mops is that it was not possible to provide a dust mop having equal distribution of the yarn over the bottom section of the mop. A further disadvantage of prior art mops is that there were many cut ends on the fringe of the outside section of the yarn on the mop and this caused linting of the mop in the laundering of such mops. In view of the foregoing, it is an important object of the present invention to provide a dust mop which overcomes the aforementioned disadvantages of the prior art dust mops.

It is another object of the present invention to provide a dust mop having a bottom section comprising a sheet of canvas into which is tufted cotton yarn extending approximately one and one-half inches below the surface of the canvas. The bottom section carries means for attaching the mop to a mop handle. An outside fringe of cotton yarn is mounted on the lower edges of the bottom section of the dust mop. The outside fringe is made by a process of weaving which forms a continuous loop of yarn which extends laterally outward and which further includes perpendicular sections of yarn which are interwoven through the continuous loops of yarn to form a shoulder. The shoulder forms a means for attaching the outside fringe, as by sewing to the bottom section of the mop.

It is another object of the present invention to pro,- vide a dust mop having an outside fringe which extends laterally outward and which includes a shoulder that is affixed to the bottom section of the dust mop, and wherein said shoulder is adapted to provide extra support to the bottom section of the mop to prevent ripping and tearing of the mop.

It is still another object of the present invention to provide a dust mop having yarn that is equally dis tributed in regards to position and weight, and wherein the lengths of the required amount of yarn can be predetermined and accurately held.

It is still another object of the present invention to provide a dust mop which has no cut ends on the fringe of the mop so as to prevent linting of the mop yarn during a laundering of the mop.

It is still another object of the present invention to provide a dust mop which is simple and compact in construction, economical to manufacture and efficient in use.

Other objects, features and advantages of this invention will be apparent from the following detailed description, appended claims, and the accompanying drawing.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING FIG. I is a top perspective view of a dust mop made in accordance with the principles of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a fragmentary elevational view of a portion of a machine adapted to weave the continuous loop, outside fringe for the dust mop of FIG. 1, and showing a fragmentary portion of said outside fringe.

FIG. 3 is a fragmentary horizontal view of the continuous loop fringe as illustrated in FIG. 2, taken along the line 3-3 and looking in the direction of the arrows.

FIG. 4 is a fragmentary, enlarged, elevational section view of structure illustrated in FIG. 1, taken along the line 4-4 and looking in the direction of the arrows.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT Referring now to the drawing, and in particular to FIG. 1, wherein is shown an illustrative embodiment of the invention, the numeral 10 generally designates a conventional mop handle which is operatively connected to the illustrative dust mop 11. The handle 10 is connected to a conventional mop supporting frame 12 which is disposed between a dust mop bottom section 13 and a dust mop top section 14.

The mop sections 13 and 14 may be made of any suitable material, as for example, canvas, and they are joined together by any suitable means as by stitching along the three sides 15, 16 and 17. On one end 18 of the dust mop, the bottom and top sections are not joined to permit the frame 12 to be slid between these two sections. The bottom section 13 is provided with a retainer flap 19 which extends up and over the open end 18 and which is attached to the upper mop section 14 by a suitable snap means 20. The mop upper section 14 is provided with a central opening 21 for connecting the handle 10 to the frame 12.

The bottom section 13 of the dust mop includes the aforementioned sheet of canvas into which is tufted a suitable dusting yarn, as for example, a cotton yarn. The cotton yarn is indicated in FIG. 3 by the numeral 22, and in one embodiment it extended below the surface of the canvas approximately 1 rt inch. Fixedly mounted on the bottom section 13 is an outside fringe of continuous loops of dusting yarn 23. This outside fringe 23 is attached to the outer edges of the lower surface of the bottom section 13, and it is extended outwardly therefrom, as shown in FIGS. 1 and 4.

The outside fringe 23 is made by a process of weaving which forms no part of this invention but which is described and disclosed in detail in U.S. Pat. No. 3,392,755, entitled A Fringe Tufting Machine", and dated July 16, I968. The continuous loops of dusting yarn in the outside fringe 23 are indicated by the numeral 24 and they are secured together by a number of perpendicular sections of yarn 25 which pass through the loops 24 to form a shoulder 33. The continuous section of outside fringe 23 is disposed along the outer edges of the lower surface of the bottom section 13, as indicated by the shoulder numerals 33, 33a, 33b and 33c. The continuous piece of the outside fringe 23 would be started at one corner, as for example, one of the corners on the open end 18 of the mop, as for example, at the corner where the shoulder portions 33 and 33c meet. The shoulder portions 33, 33a, 33b and 33c would be attached by any suitable means to the mop sections 13 and 14, as by the stitching 34 as indicated in FIG. 4.

FIG. 2 illustrates a fragmentary portion of the tufting machine for making the continuous outside fringe 23.

The structure shown in FIG. 2 is a reproduction of the structure shown in FIG. of the aforementioned US. Pat. No. 3,392,755, and which is described in detail in said patent. For purposes of illustration, numerals 26 and 27 designate fingers of the tufting machine which are used for weaving a fringe 23. The numeral 28 indicates a tufting machine table which is provided with an opening 29 through which the loops 23 extend. The numeral 30 is a bottom plate of the feed wheel of the tufting machine which is provided with a key slot 31 and the numeral 32 indicates a feed wheel. The numeral 35 indicates a hook employed in the tufting machine of said patent.

The shoulder 33 of the outside fringe adds extra strength and support to the canvas bottom section 13 and prevents ripping and tearing. In the mop of the present invention, the yarn extends outwardly from the mop, whereas in the prior art mops, some of the yarn was brought back into what is normally called the inside section of the mop. The mop of the present invention is stronger than the prior art mops in that if one part of the stitching which is used to fasten the outside fringe 23 to the canvas bottom section 13 should break, the loops 24 would still be supported by the continuous shoulder sections 33 and the loops 24 will not come off. Whereas, in the prior art mops, if a couple of stitches were to break, then the yarn would be released.

A further advantage of the mop of the present invention is that the length for the yarn of the outside loops 24 can be predetermined and accurately held as to weight and equal distribution of the yarn, and this advantage is not present in the prior art dust mops. A further feature of the dust mop of the present invention is that there are no cut ends on the outside fringe 23 so that there is no linting of the outside loops 23 in a laundry process.

While it will be apparent that the preferred embodiment of the invention herein disclosed is well calculated to fulfill the objects above stated, it will be appreciated that the invention is susceptible to modification, variation and change.

What we claim is:

l. A dust mop comprising a. a first section including a first sheet of flexible material,

b. a second section including a second sheet of flexible material having a generally centrally located circular opening, said second sheet being of the same general configuration as said first sheet,

c. said first and second sheets being permanently attached to each other along a portion of their outer edges whereby a further portion of their outer edges remains unsecured,

d. means for detachably securing said unsecured portion of said outer edges,

e. a frame member inserted between said sheets whereby said sheets are held in a generally planar configuration,

f. means for attaching a handle member to said frame member.

g. said attaching means being arranged to extend through said circular opening provided in said second sheet,

h. a lower surface of said first sheet being provided with a center portion covered with a tufted yarn to provide a dus collecting function and a fringe of continuous loops of dusting yarn arranged to extend outwardly around the outer edge,

. said fringe including a shoulder comprising a plurality of yarns interwoven with said loops and disposed perpendicular to said loops,

j. said shoulder being attached to the underside of said first sheet whereby said shoulder and loops are disposed generally parallel to the plane of said sheet, and

k. said tufted yarn comprising a plurality of individual yarn lengths, the central portion of each yarn length being looped through said first sheet of flexible material with the free ends thereof extending in a direction transverse to the plane of said sheet. 

1. A dust mop comprising a. a first section including a first sheet of flexible material, b. a second section including a second sheet of flexible material having a generally centrally located circular opening, said second sheet being of the same general configuration as said first sheet, c. said first and second sheets being permanently attached to each other along a portion of their outer edges whereby a further portion of their outer edges remains unsecured, d. means for detachably securing said unsecured portion of said outer edges, e. a frame member inserted between said sheets whereby said sheets are held in a generally planar configuration, f. means for attaching a handle member to said frame member. g. said attaching means being arranged to extend through said circular opening provided in said second sheet, h. a lower surface of said first sheet being provided with a center portion covered with a tufted yarn to provide a dust collecting function and a fringe of continuous loops of dusting yarn arranged to extend outwardly around the outer edge, i. said fringe including a shoulder comprising a plurality of yarns interwoven with said loops and disposed perpendicular to said loops, j. said shoulder being attached to the underside of said first sheet whereby said shoulder and loops are disposed generally parallel to the plane of said sheet, and k. said tufted yarn comprising a plurality of individual yarn lengths, the central portion of each yarn length being looped through said first sheet of flexible material with the free ends thereof extending in a direction transverse to the plane of said sheet. 